Survival of Consciousness after Death - Skeptiko Community Led List

Ok, I'm throwing out a quick list here, I'm going to need everyone's help in choosing the best language to underscore the themes and terms. Thanks again to Jim_Smith for sharing your writings. I'm going to attempt to combine some categories. For example, the overlapping ideas between 'Drop-in Communications,' 'Proxy Sittings,' 'Cross-Correspondences,' and 'Prophecy,' or between 'Crisis Apparitions,' and 'Death-bed Visions'

The term Near Death Experience I don't think should be a category in itself, it seems that it matters more what happens, what kind of NDE an experiencer has. The kind of experience that occurs during an NDE is more suitable for a category (in my humble opinion, feel free to disagree with any/all of this)

I'm going to post this list to my first post on this thread at the top.
My opinion, something like NDE should be its own category. If it were up to me, Id have it sorted out something like this

Reasons we know the survival theory prevails

1) NDEs
-various bullet points, links etc

2) Re-incarnation data
-various bullet points, links etc

3) Medium data
-various bullet points, links etc

4)Pre-birth and life intermission memories (not sure if you guys would want this category but the testimony is strong, the testimony is consistent between reports, and there are many on oberf.org)
-various bullet points, links etc

5)The experience of ghosts (same as above, its a worldwide phenomenon experienced in all cultures throughout all history, though this category is important in my personal opinion, its rather difficult to demonstrate to the skeptic, that's not the case for 1 through 3)
-various bullet points, links etc

6) etc

7)etc
 
Alex asked me to take the lead on developing a little bit of a primer on survival of consciousness after death with the help of everyone in the forums. We’d like you all to throw in some interesting points you’ve come across either on Skeptiko or through your related interests. Hopefully we can have a discussion around them and create something along the lines of a ‘Top Ten’ list around the topic that can then be posted on the website for anyone, whether they’re just discovering either the Skeptiko pod and community or the survival of consciousness issue. There is enough knowledge and wisdom among the Skeptiko community that it’d be a crime not to get those of you interested involved in the discussion.

Hey Zach - not sure whether you know of this already, and/or whether it's at all useful, but just in case it is, here's a link to an existing Index of Skeptiko threads & related resources (last updated 12 July 2017).
 
My opinion, something like NDE should be its own category. If it were up to me, Id have it sorted out something like this

Reasons we know the survival theory prevails

1) NDEs
-various bullet points, links etc

2) Re-incarnation data
-various bullet points, links etc

3) Medium data
-various bullet points, links etc

4)Pre-birth and life intermission memories (not sure if you guys would want this category but the testimony is strong, and there are many on oberf.org)
-various bullet points, links etc

5)The experience of ghosts (same as above, its a worldwide phenomenon experienced in all cultures throughout all history, though this category is important in my personal opinion, its rather difficult to demonstrate to the skeptic, that's not the case for 1 through 3)
-various bullet points, links etc

6) etc

7)etc

Thanks a ton Wormwood!

I'm thinking we may need to take a step back here and decide what the list topic should be. Ie 'Things to know about Survival of Consciousness after Death' vs. 'Things we know that prove Survival of Consciousness after Death is real'

I'm not sure that writing a list that proves SOCAD (my new acronym) is as useful as listing the most striking, and perhaps unexplained, phenomenon associated with it. Ideas? Maybe a 'Top Ten' list isn't the best way forward?

Also, totally forgot about Ghosts/Hauntings!!!
 
Thanks a ton Wormwood!

I'm thinking we may need to take a step back here and decide what the list topic should be. Ie 'Things to know about Survival of Consciousness after Death' vs. 'Things we know that prove Survival of Consciousness after Death is real'

I'm not sure that writing a list that proves SOCAD (my new acronym) is as useful as listing the most striking, and perhaps unexplained, phenomenon associated with it. Ideas? Maybe a 'Top Ten' list isn't the best way forward?

Also, totally forgot about Ghosts/Hauntings!!!
I can provide links and videos of testimony of several well documented cases, a case involving police officers and a prison warden, and a case in Gary IN where two social workers and a nurse reported that they witnessed a child seemingly possessed walk up a wall backwards to the ceiling. These are two examples, there are hundreds. But again, for this topic, Im not sure a possessed child demonstrates survival, but the experience of departed individuals in apparitional form does at least support the theory.
 
I can provide links and videos of testimony of several well documented cases, a case involving police officers and a prison warden, and a case in Gary IN where two social workers and a nurse reported that they witnessed a child seemingly possessed walk up a wall backwards to the ceiling. These are two examples, there are hundreds. But again, for this topic, Im not sure a possessed child demonstrates survival, but the experience of departed individuals in apparitional form does at least support the theory.

Thanks Wormwood! I'm still considering how to organize. I like your idea of NDE experiences being a separate category that can then be narrowed down, but it may narrow down into specific things whether it be encountering God, dead relatives, overhearing conversations, or simply being able to experience things like sight and sound when the physical body/brain cannot do so while actually alive. Any ideas on how you'd break down the NDE category, or why not?
 
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Maybe a way to categorize is like Wormwood mentioned, breaking things down into
NDEs - those who've had an experience
NDE After-effects
Mediums
Reincarnation

and some category for those who've had an experience with ghosts/haunting or
close relatives/friends of someone who's passed on where there was a Shared Death Experience or Crisis Apparition
and maybe even under this heading, those who've experienced healing from grief & bereavement around someone who's passed after learning about SOCAD

still brainstorming here...
 
with ghosts you are gonna want to apply a very good filter with it, cause probably a lot of cases can be explained away

do be on the look out for extraordinary cases , very hard to find, but you can find them (i've read one or two)

one that does stick out very well is NDE Aftereffects, but im thinking you'll have to find out the cause of NDE's in each patient, maybe to rule out any weird effects from chest paddles or something

im not entirely sure.

also as said, keep an eye out on the claimant, see if they have anything to gain from their story, i'm fairly cool with people who may post theirs online somewhere obscure, same for reincarnation ones too,
 
<sigh>

Ok. Let's do this.

"...quantum mechanics science shows that matter at the atomic level ceases to exist without an observing consciousness"

Show your homework for this statement.
I do think it can be used as part of the puzzle, but in and of its self of course does not show that consciousness survives. I think it may help demonstrate duality. Which can be a launching point.
 
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<sigh>



Show your homework for this statement.

"The only thing that can describe an elementary particle is a probability function that, in itself, contains nothing about the quality of being, or the physical existence of that particle"- Werner Heisenberg

"The common sense view of the world in terms of objects that really exist "out there" independently of our observations totally collapses in the face of the quantum factor"-Neihls Bohr

"Hence it is clear that the space of physics is not, in the last analysis, anything given in nature or independent of human thought" - Albert Einstein

I think the quantum eraser demonstrates this more completely than the double slit experiment, but the double slit experiment demonstrated it in the first place

Tom Campbell goes into detail on this during the first two hours of his lecture, heres the first hour


As far as I can tell, the old Nobel Peace prize winners, a few of them mentioned above in the quotes, absolutely thought consciousness was responsible. The newer prevailing thought amongst academic scientists is that its not consciousness of course, but that's really because they are frightened of the implications and because it does not fit their worldview, not because of new data. There are those like Tom Campbell (see video above), and also the man who did the very quantum eraser experiment who are open to duality and spiritual concepts however who are open to believing that the data actually does shows what it shows, that consciousness plays a part. This also fits the idea of the "Simulation Theory" which many find so compelling. But this isn't surprising. There are many other studies showing the effect that consciousness plays on real outcomes. Like Dean Radins:
 
right though i can't prove this universally, but i am wanting to buy a spirit box, and do a double or triple blind experiment with it (if that's the right term) but essentially things others may know that i do not i live near a few places that could be haunted, hopefully in time i will post my findings

that is if you trust me , but in order to avoid paredolia/confirmation bias i'm going to ask it questions to things i do not know, like street names of areas i am not in or have no clue or that

any extra recommendations ?
 
i'll also see if i can get a scientist friend of mine on board, hopefully she or someone else could document this with me
 
I don’t think quantum physics should be included, not for something like this. If we were writing a book, maybe.
 
Anyone else think Quantum Mechanics doesn't fit? Maybe it should be scratched from the list.

Personally I don't know enough to say one way or another.

I don't have an opinion on what should be included in the project. I am posting this for informational purposes. No matter what you include, there will be people who will argue against it. But also, different people are convinced by different types of evidence. Some of the early founders of quantum mechanics, scientists, found this evidence, coming from physics experiments, convincing when they might not have paid any attention to other typs of evidence. The evidence from quantum mechanics is objective and repeatable in a lab. It does not depend on subjective reports or fortuitous circumstances. This makes it extraordinarily convincing to some people.

The argument from quantum mechanics is that certain experiments show that matter cannot exist without consciousness so it is impossible that matter (ie the brain) could produce consciousness.
https://sites.google.com/site/chs4o8pt/summary_of_evidence#summary_evidence_quantum

When physicists study matter at the subatomic level, they find that matter does not exist until it is observed by a conscious being. Double-slit experiments demonstrate that a conscious observer is required to collapse a probability wave into a particle. Quantum entanglement experiments demonstrate that certain properties of matter are not determined until they are observed by a conscious observer. Therefore consciousness is necessary first before matter can exist, so it is impossible for consciousness to have been produced by matter. Therefore the it is impossible that the brain, which is composed of matter, could produce consciousness. Founders of quantum mechanics, including Nobel Prize winners in physics such as Max Planck and Erwin Schrödinger, believed this. You can find more information on these scientists in the chapter on Eminent Researchers.

Furthermore, if something in an unstable quantum state is observed continuously by a conscious observer, it will not decay. This is called the quantum Zeno effect. The effect cannot be produced by matter alone which indicates that consciousness cannot be produced by any physical process.

Observations in quantum mechanics must be made by conscious observers according to John von Neumann:
In his treatise The Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, John von Neumann deeply analyzed the so-called measurement problem. He concluded that the entire physical universe could be made subject to the Schrödinger equation (the universal wave function). Since something "outside the calculation" was needed to collapse the wave function, von Neumann concluded that the collapse was caused by the consciousness of the experimenter.[22]
Wikipedia​

Max Plank the founder of quantum mechanics and winner of the Nobel prize in physics said:
I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness. As quoted in The Observer (25 January 1931)​

And ...

As a man who has devoted his whole life to the most clear headed science, to the study of matter, I can tell you as a result of my research about atoms this much: There is no matter as such. All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter.​

Das Wesen der Materie [The Nature of Matter], speech at Florence, Italy (1944) (from Archiv zur Geschichte der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Abt. Va, Rep. 11 Planck, Nr. 1797)​


Erwin Schrödinger winner of the Nobel prize in physics wrote:
"Consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental. It cannot be accounted for in terms of anything else." http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/show/325387
 
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